A Fool's Paradise

"...the poet who refuses to face our tough and predatory reality
is living in a fool's paradise."
Czeslaw Milosz

on the other hand:

"It's a bad idea and a complete waste of time to prescribe what poets must or must not do because the best ones will always rebel and do the opposite."
Charles Simic

and here's a poem by HL:

Exercises

On their blogs, the poets give writing exercises
I, being contrary, think life's meat demands
such attention; how could I write
simply to display my virtuosity, using,
say, a list of twelve words?
No, I don't write poetry because I'm clever;
some days I write because
I simply must acknowledge
this
moment.
I must make something of it, because a blink
is all it is. And one day I'll be dead.
No one will know about
how blessed I feel now
with the cool air blowing in my face
the cats curled nearby
heavy metal rocking in the corner,
the possibility of
a cigarette.

There are so many humans now;
one day there will be none.
Will there be Spielbergian robots
that can read our poetry?
Do we want to leave behind
clever
displays of skill?
Or is it, as I think, more important
to write down our hearts,
to write down how baffled we are
by the mystery?

O robots,
if you are the only intelligence
left on this earth ---
capable of deciphering the printed word,
perhaps not capable of
feeling ---
try to wrap your electronic
brains around this concept:
I feel sad today,
thinking that the human future
we all should want to hold as its heart beats
is being wrecked by
our own apathy,
meat-shredding teeth,
boredom, which drives us to
kill the sky, make Hell,
pretending to dwell
in peace.

I should mention that the quotes above the poem are from an excellent book of essays by Charles Simic entitled The Metaphysician in the Dark (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003).

Another remark: no offense to those poets who enjoy writing exercises, so do I in just a slightly different frame of mind. Another quote from Czeslaw Milosz:

"The purpose of poetry is to remind us
how difficult it is to remain just one person."

So to all of the various people each of us are, may the poetry gods bless you with iambic blessings, or if you're really picky, with dactyllic ones.

--- Harriet.